Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Wow, Alex Tripp is on-point.

Okay, so, on this new Matmos album, which I've talked about in the past- (Antony sings on it, and there's an instrument made from a cow vagina/reproductive organs, played with a vacuum cleaner, sounding kind of like a bagpipe- I thought that was an odd combo) there's a song, track 3, called Tract For Valerie Solanas. The concept of the album is a series of portraits for people, with sounds for them- Track 9, Rag for William S. Burroughs, has typewriters for percussion, for example.

Anyway. The tract has more vocals than most, a pretty constant voice, saying things which I don't think are in the SCUM Manifesto but I read that awhile ago. "get a good job, comanaging the shitpile" gets said, as does "Destroy the male sex."

Anyway. What Alex just pointed out to me, that he apparently got like a week ago, is what the sounds that aren't vocals are. The more musical sounds. That's the cow vagina and accompanying organs. Or, a reproductive tract. It's a pun.

And man, holy shit- Matmos can talk all they want about the album, and how they hope people get it when it comes out, since the packaging's so important, (Dan Clowes is involved, drawing something) but this, the slow reveal of the tracklisting with the knowledge of the people, without the aid of liner notes, is something special. Just learning bits of someone's history and then listening to the track for those sounds- The sound of a cigarette burning flesh on "Germs Burn For Darby Crash," for example- It's really fun.

Like on first listen I was thinking "this is a really great album, probably going to end up being the best of the year," and then, the more I listen, the more I learn, the more I catch. There's layers to this.

I imagine that actually buying the album, with liner notes detailing sound sources, will just be such an epiphany.

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